Practice Random Acts of Kindness

Normally I try to make my blog posts about some helpful bit of information related to the voiceover industry. But lately I feel like we could all use a little more kindness in our lives.

Just this morning, I woke up at my usual 5 a.m. to go work out, and as I was heading out the door I noticed there was a piece of paper taped to the front door. (I’m actually kind of amazed I noticed ANYTHING at that hour of the morning, in my sleepy half-awake stupor.) When I opened the front door, there was a sign that said, “You’ve been BOO’d!” along with an explanation that one of our neighbors had decided to share some early Halloween treats with us. Sure enough, there was a bag of candy on the front porch!

The note went on to explain that we should “keep the BOO going” by making a copy of the note and “BOO’ing” two of our neighbors.

Now, I know, this COULD sound an awful lot like a chain letter, (which I am NOT a fan of), but the idea was actually just to practice a small, random act of kindness to make someone else’s day a little better. (I can tell you my kiddos, when they woke up a couple of hours later, were DELIGHTED to see that we had been “BOO’d” and spent the rest of the morning wondering who might have “BOO’d” us, and discussing who we might “BOO” in the upcoming days.)

This one simple gesture made us start our morning on such a high; it made us all smile.

Shouldn’t we try to do that for others?

With that in mind, I would challenge each of us to practice random acts of kindness on a regular basis. You never know what is going on in somebody else’s world. Sometimes just a smile or a simple “hello” can make all the difference to someone. It doesn’t cost you a thing, but it can pay off in ways you could never imagine.